USA Climbs Six Spots to Number 13 in Latest FIFA Rankings

The United States Men’s National Team climbed six spots in the latest FIFA world rankings, coming in at No. 13 in the world rankings that were released on Thursday.

It is the highest ranking for the U.S. since July 2010 and has been built on a run that has seen the Americans win 13 of their last 14 matches. The latest win came on Tuesday against Mexico, with the 2-0 victory helping the U.S. secure its seventh consecutive World Cup berth.

The USA’s current run has seen it post victories against Germany, go undefeated in winning the Gold Cup, and winning four of its last five World Cup qualifying matches.

The ranking highlights the improvement the squad has made under coach Jurgen Klinsmann, who has taken the team from its No. 36 ranking in the summer of 2012 to its current position.

The U.S. has two qualifying matches remaining before the World Cup draw on Dec. 6.

Spain retained the top spot for the 25th consecutive month. Argentina moved up to No. 2 after clinching a spot in its 11th straight World Cup with a 5-2 win at Paraguay on Tuesday. Germany dropped a spot to third, Italy remained fourth and Colombia fell two places to No. 5. England fell to number 17.

They’re hardly “bought and paid for”. They’re calculated using a transparent, fairly logical formula. (Personally I might argue about the differing weight it gives to the different regions, friendlies, etc, but it’s not an awful system).

The problem is that teams just don’t play each other often enough to give the rankings any validity.

In tennis for example, the same guys play each other (or at least play in the same tournaments) multiple times per year. So if Nadal is above Murray in the rankings, it’s pretty hard to argue against – you just look at their many results over the last year.

In football the top teams rarely play each other, rarely even play in the same competiton, and in fact rarely play at all. So it’s really hard to take the ranking seriously.

Also, I’d suggest that something mus be wrong with the calculations if England can drop from an all time high of 3rd last year (which I think was implausible in itself) to a 20-year low of 17th today in just one year. Sure, they’ve been underwhelming in the last year, but surely not that bad?